


Numb

by a_xmasmurder



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond - All Media Types
Genre: A Bit Not Good, Alcohol Abuse, Anger, Angst, Danger Night, Dangerous thoughts, Feelings sometimes aren't good, Inability to handle emotions, M/M, Post Traumatic Stress, Post mission stress, Sadness, Taking it out on the wall, self-abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-19
Updated: 2013-09-19
Packaged: 2017-12-27 02:08:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/973037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_xmasmurder/pseuds/a_xmasmurder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sometimes, it's hard. Hard to do the mission, hard to come back from it, hard to finalise the mission, hard to keep breathing afterwards.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Numb

James Bond swallowed the last bit of the Scotch in his glass and glared at the laptop screen in front of him. The words on the page stared right back at him, unchanging in their black lines and curves, mocking him. Time signatures. Names. Places. Number of times he had to fire his PPK. Number of deaths. Words and numbers, unfeeling and cold on the white background. _Bits and bytes and lines of code,_ Q would say with a sardonic twist of his red lips, teeth baring for just a moment. _Nothing more than lines of code, once you input it into a word programme. No one seems to think of the cost of those words, of those lines of code._ Bond chuckled, a dark sound rumbling out of the depths of his chest, not at all even resembling something close to happiness. _You got that right, at least. No one seems to think of the human cost. No one thinks at all._

He wanted to break the little laptop on the desk, smash the screen, grab the Walther from the little bedside table and shoot the everloving shit out of the computer and just say to hell with it all and not go back in the morning. Hell, never go back again. But he stayed where he was, seated at his workstation, and picked up the half-empty bottle to fill his glass for the third time in an hour, ignoring the slight shake of his hand. The glass bottle clinked on the glass tumbler, a sharp sound that didn’t even register with him. Neither did the sound of the amber liquid pouring out into the empty space, filling it up to and nearly over the brim. He lit another cigarette from the nearly empty packet next to the keyboard and inhaled, the harsh smoke filling his lungs. The burn in his throat didn’t register in his mind, either. He shifted into a outwardly calm state that belied the utter turmoil that ransacked his brain and soul.

He blinked at the screen again and set his fingers lightly on the plastic keys, again thinking about the last mission. Thinking about the people he had to kill. Thinking about the innocent people caught in the twin blasts that had started it all, and the innocent people caught in the blast that had ended it quite spectacularly. He could see it all in his mind’s eye, the chaos and destruction that he’d compartmentalised at the time. It was all coming out now, violence like liquid steel pouring out of the forge built to keep it contained. _God damn it._

His stomach complained about the lack of food, complained about being empty, but he ignored it and downed half the glass of Scotch. It wasn’t even the good stuff, but it went down like water, only more appetising and less fulfilling. He didn’t care. He set his hand back down on the keyboard, then remembered he was still holding the glass when the screen scrolled with the letter ‘L’. He pushed the glass off the laptop, all the way down to the floor, and cursed everything quite soundly and colourfully. He left the tumbler where it was and set his hand back down, ready to type something. His stomach kicked like a mule as he looked back to the memories again. Or not. He took another drag of his cigarette and sighed, irritated at his inability to get this fucking report done. The smoke rushed out of his nose and mouth in thin ghostly lines, and he scowled at the blinking cursor only partially obscured by the cigarette smoke. _It’s mocking me. It’s mocking this whole fucking thing. It’s mocking what I’ve written, and mocking what I can’t write. Mocking what I would never write. Fucking reports._

They were supposed to be easy, after action reports. It should be done by now. He’d been writing them since he started in the military, since he joined England’s elite forces, since he joined MI6 and since he became a Double O. Each time, it got equally easier and harder. Easier, because the new technology tried to make the process more streamlined and smooth; harder, because he was getting older.

Each assignment was getting harder to do, mentally and physically. He and his fellow agents were showing the strains of their particular lifestyles, the type of lifestyle that doesn’t lend itself to retirement accounts and properties out in Sussex with flowers and white picket fences. Joints ached, old injuries flared up at the worst times - like when one was in the middle of dismantling a bomb and all of a sudden one’s right hand quit fucking working, or when one was running from the enemy, trying to get to a safer location so one could get extracted and then a sudden sharp pain in a bad knee takes one to the ground in full view of their attackers...and then the bullets come, sharp and biting and they bloody fucking hurt… He had to shake his head to rid himself of that useless memory.

The enemy was getting smarter, too. They had more technology and money and disgruntled personnel - look at all the soldiers out of work, PTSD and injuries and the lot, looking to make a few extra pounds, not caring where they get their next payday -  and the stakes were getting higher and higher.  The bar was being set on a new rung each time, and the highest was on 9/11 and 7/7. _Poor New York and London. Fucking terrorists. It’s getting harder and harder to catch the bad guys._

And good Lord, did they try. Leiter was still kicking himself in the face for not catching the signs earlier, and so was...well, the whole of the SIS, really. _We can sit here and blame ourselves for each and every failure because that is what Congress and Parliament do. We are the fucking scapegoats when something goes wrong, every time; yet they scream and come running to us, to Section 20, to the Double O programme, to the SAS and SBS every time something happens in the world, come screaming to us to fix it, fix it now. Even though we are working day and night to try to make the world a safer place for our people to live in, every time we fail they blame it on us and cut our funding or our personnel, hell, even both._ He couldn’t even remember the last time Q had actually slept since the most recent cuts to his intern pool. _Poor kid runs himself into the concrete, then tries to get back up to work more. He’s too young for this, he’s too young to die of heart failure or high blood pressure or a fucking aneurysm._ He stopped for a moment and stared at the wall. _And me. What’s keeping me going?_

He stared at the cursor again, and started to type, only remembering to shove the half-smoked cigarette into the ashtray when the thing fell out of his fingers and landed on the back of his hand. He let it sit there for a couple seconds, until he could feel the sharp stabbing pain of the cherry burning into his skin, then removed it and stubbed it out. He waited for the pain to fade away to nothing once more, then turned back to the screen.

After ten more minutes of typing, editing, deleting the whole paragraph, then repeating the process over and over again, he gave up entirely. The words just weren’t coming anymore.

He felt like shooting the computer again, so he stood up, picked up the bottle of Scotch, and walked out of the bedroom into the expanse of his stupidly large sitting room. He couldn’t just sit there and stare at the screen. He had to do something. Anything. The lights were still off in the other two bedrooms, which meant that either Eve had found someone to go home with or she had never been here, and Alec wasn’t back from his most recent trip to Moscow yet. James scowled, his dark mood passing over his face like a supercell thunderstorm. _Two others who deserve vacations. Not to mention half the staff at MI6. When was the last time Alec had been in the flat for more time than it took to grab another garment bag and a slice of toast from Q or Eve as he headed out on another assignment?_ James growled. _At least it wasn’t the fucking deep cover work the old bitch had him doing._ He felt the deep seated rage boiling once more at that memory, all the memories of that particular mission, threatening to cause him to do something very, very rash. _Fucking bitch almost stole from me the only thing I had that was close to steady, close to normal, close to home. Fucking bitch. England and MI6 and M nearly cost me my best fucking friend, and I’m still. Here. I’m still HERE._

He twisted at the hip and threw the bottle of Scotch at the wall, listening as the glass shattered and tinkled down to the hardwood floor. He barely noticed the full-throated roar that accompanied it, but he heard the echo in the air. He stood in the middle of the room, panting and growling, fists clenching and unclenching, unrelenting in his self-righteous anger. “Fucking goddamned whore! All of it! Fuck!” He bit out the word, tasting blood and bitter memories on his tongue. “Fuck this. Fuck it. Fuck all of it.” He picked up the vase that had come with the horrid fucking flat and threw that at the wall, aiming for the alcohol splashed on the beige wall. Bright blue glass sparkled and joined the clear glass on the floor, the crash sounding lovely to his ears.

 _Destruction. Death and destruction, that’s all I’m fucking good for anymore._ He didn’t feel the tears that rolled down his cheeks, only the cool trail that they left behind. They only pissed him off even more. _And now I’m fucking crying like a schoolboy whose lunch money has been stolen. Very macho man, James fucking Bond, very fucking masculine. Big bad super secret agent man._ The black vase was next in line, and tiny shards embedded into the paint on the wall. The single pink rose that had been in it lay in the mess of glass, half the petals floating in the water that mingled with the puddle of alcohol. His chest went bowstring-tight with sudden regret.

That vase had been a gift from Q, two days ago, the one rare day that he’d gotten away from TSS and gone to a flower shop to get James the vase and flower ‘just because’. And now he’d gone and thrown the damned thing against the wall. _Destruction. Destroy all the good things in my life._ His knees buckled beneath him and he crashed to the floor, sliding against the suede sofa and dropping his aching head to the cushions. He stared at the ceiling and breathed, actually sat and breathed like the quacks at Psych told him to do when he felt ‘angry’.

Angry. Ha-fucking-ha. He didn’t feel angry. He was always angry, an angry little soldier waiting for his next fight. No, he wasn’t angry. Right now he felt _murderous._ Rage swirled with regret and grief and fear and exhaustion, and goddamn it, he was drunk, alright? A bottle and a half of shit Scotch, and he’d thrown the rest of it against the fucking wall and then wrecked a gift from the Quartermaster - who doesn’t just give out gifts like party favours - what was he supposed to do about that, huh? He closed his eyes and breathed. ‘Just let it out’, the psychiatrists said. Yeah, let it out. That’s what he was doing, right now, and it wasn’t fucking helping. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to _feel_ anymore. He was in this bleeding programme in the first place for his skills and his ability to compartmentalise, to just push it all aside and continue on. Well, that was all well and good at the time, in the middle of an assignment, when he had to not think about the kid he just had to kill or the woman he had to seduce for information or all the unfortunate fucking people he couldn’t save...but it all had to come out in the end, didn’t it, or it would fester and infect his life until he turned into someone like 0012, who couldn’t even look at London’s crowds without seeing a battlefield. That man had to be forced into retirement, and two days later was found in his expensive penthouse flat that he bought with MI6’s money with a gaping hole in the back of his head. _Would I even last that long?_

“James,” a tired voice called out, quiet and calm despite the obvious destruction.

James’ twitch reflexes flared to life, reacting to the threat, and he had his gun out, front reticle centred on the Quartermaster’s forehead, before he even registered his own name. He focused on the emerald eyes staring back at him from behind the thick-framed glasses, deadened and dark with stormy emotions. _Or was that just a reflection of my own eyes?_ No...oh. _Oh, shit._ He lowered the gun, almost as an afterthought, and waved to the kitchen, indicated that the Quartermaster could have his pick of anything in the room. Anything. Well, anything he hadn’t already thrown against the wall in his tantrum.

Q didn’t move from his spot just inside the door, bags sagging off of slumped shoulders, his computer bag lying on the floor at his feet. _Jesus Christ almighty, he looks dead on his feet and...defeated. What happened…_ James grunted in greeting as his muddled brain reminded him of a very intense mission in Hong Kong, with one of the three female agents...

James took a deep breath, pushed aside his own emotions for a moment. “004?”

“She’ll make it.” Clipped, cold.

 _Not a good sign. He’s normally talkative, even to curse and scream about a mission gone wrong. This one was bad, then._ “Did we -”

“I don’t want to talk about it, James.” The sharp retort caught Bond wrong-footed. No, not the retort - the tone of Q’s voice. He sounded…

 _Like me. God, no, he’s too young for this…_ He wasn’t sure how much angrier he could get before he just spontaneously combusted or went nuclear. Glowing red was an option.

“Q.” He kept his voice regulated, much like how the higher ups would if they ran into a Double O just off of a mission, to keep the pet wolverines and honey badgers from going off and causing more damage than necessary. Keep them calm, keep them focused. _Yeah, fucking fuck off._ He winced when he realised he’d been using the same tactic with the Quartermaster, but for a different reason. _I want him to talk, damn it. Talk to me, Q._ He couldn’t say the words, though.

The smaller man turned and stalked - stalked - into the kitchen, opened the liquor cabinet, and pulled out a bottle of Stoli, took the cap off, and took two healthy swallows. “James. This is non-negotiable. I’m not talking about it.” He walked back into the sitting area, toeing his shoes and socks off as he went. James watched him like a hawk, forgetting for a moment about the broken glass on the floor - _fuck!_

“Q, wait -”

“God _damn_ it!” Q recoiled, lifting his left foot up and away from the scattered shards. Drops of blood splattered on the floor, and James felt horrid, absolutely fucking horrid. Just another emotion to add to the mud in his soul. “Fucking...ow!” The bottle of vodka went to the coffee table, barely on the edge as Q toppled backwards onto his arse and grabbed his foot. “Damn it, _damn it!_ ”

James flexed his fingers, wanting to help Q, wanting to bust another bottle, wanting to get the fuck out of there and drive, wanting Q to start crying or hurl something at his head or something. Anything. His body stayed in neutral, muscles twitching and brain firing on too many cylinders at once to do anything. Q stared hard at the bottom of his foot and pulled the largish sliver of blue glass out of his skin. “Was this the vase from the table?”

 _Oh, God, fucking hell. Here it comes._ James braced for impact as Q looked at the wall, at the multicoloured glass on the floor and the lone flower in the mess. He took a breath and waited for the indignant screech, the sobbing, the looks of disappointment and hurt and…

Q looked up at James with the best damned poker face this side of Monaco. “Bad night?”

James only nodded, not trusting his voice or his brain not to say something moronic.

“It wasn’t the good alcohol, was it?”

James shook his head and swallowed.

“Well, there’s that.” Q huffed out a breath, and got to his feet, bloody and barefoot, and walked to James. James noticed a couple more winces as Q found more shards, but this time he didn’t stop to pull them out. He kept walking, leaving a bloody trail over the hardwood, until he reached James. Q looked up, into his eyes, and took a deep breath. “I think I know what we both need. Are you in love with that bottle of Stoli?”

James stared back at him in confusion, looking at his own reflection in those exhausted and dead green eyes. “Not really. It’s Alec’s.”

“I’ll buy him a new one.” Q walked back to the coffee table and snatched the bottle up again. Burnt copper and the crisp tang of the vodka mixing with the smoky Scotch started tickling James’ nose, setting off a chain of reactions in his brain, none of them even in the ballpark of good. He watched Q’s throat as he tipped the bottle back once more for a long drink, the long line of the muscles and tendons and his Adam’s apple creating a visceral image in James’ brain. Oh, how he longed to have his hands wrapped around that neck, pressing his fingers into the pale skin along Q’s veins, stroking and squeezing until Q gasped for the breath he couldn’t - wouldn’t - have... _No, no, fuck no, never, not even remotely!_ James shook his head to rid himself of that very not good image, but his eyes were drawn to Q once more. The Quartermaster’s eyes crinkled at the undoubtedly antiseptic taste of the straight alcohol, creating lovely lines in his skin, lines James wanted to trace with his tongue, bite it, suck on that pale skin until he marked it blood red and bruise dark... His pulse started throbbing low in his stomach, and he felt the tell-tale tightness in his bespoke trousers. _Damn it._

Then he jumped as a loud crash and a growl broke the silence in the flat. He looked at the wall, where a new stain graced the paint, and more clear glass littered the wood floor. James shifted his stare to Q, who turned suddenly and gripped James by the lapels of his shirt, bloody toes pressing into his stocking clad feet. The beast inside of James tore at the ropes holding it in, itching for a fight, but the desperation that sparked to life in Q’s eyes kept it at bay. _He’s not attacking me, he’s -_

When Q pushed forward with a helpless whine, it was a train crash at full speed, teeth pressing painfully against his lips, bringing heat and sensation to the surface. It was nothing as simple and gentle as a kiss, it was more like an explosion of emotion and feeling that set James ablaze with surging lust and sudden confusion. Q bit and sucked his bottom lip, and James tasted blood, real blood this time that came on the tail end of a sharp nick. He growled and gripped Q by the shoulders, fingertips digging hard into the tight muscles through the light dress shirt he wore. Q moaned into James’ mouth, his tongue dabbing at the tiny cut he’d made in James’ lip. The sharp pain flew along Bond’s nerves and straight into his brain, and he shoved Q away from him, backwards, and collapsed onto the couch.

“What the hell,” he panted, “what the bloody hell was that, Q?”

Q himself was breathing heavy, licking his lips to wash away the streaks of red, chasing the taste of James on his skin. “That...James. Bond.” He snapped out the name like a bad taste and blinked, hard, once. “I need something. I need something other than this…” He spread his hands. “This bloody emptiness I feel, I don’t like it. I don’t like losing agents.”

“You didn’t -”

“I _did,_ James!” Q growled. “I lost.” He fisted his hands into his wild hair and yanked hard. “I lost, and nearly got an agent killed, and I just want to _fucking die!_ ” He took one step and dropped down onto the couch, straddling James, his thin legs and arms bracketing James on the cushions. His long fingers dug into the material as he leaned forward and pressed his forehead to James’. He stayed like that for a while, his breaths coming out in growly pants, his eyes squeezed shut against whatever demons were ripping his brilliant mind apart. James stayed still for him, stayed quiet and still and tried to convey some sort of calm to Q, but with his own rage still rolling around in his gut and his brain and his nerves he wasn’t sure what good it was doing. Finally, Q sagged, boneless, and collapsed fully onto Bond’s torso. A moment later, he started trembling, and James jerked in realisation that Q was crying.

_Oh my fucking God. Who do I have to murder? I’ll kill every fucking person in this world if it means that this brilliant boy will stop. Crying._

“Please…” Q murmured, and curled up on Bond’s lap like a scared child. “Please don’t get angrier. I...you don’t have to do anything, just this.” He hiccoughed, and took a shuddery breath. “Don’t let me fall.”

James finally wrapped his arms around Q and held him close as he cried. It was all he could do. Q would do the same for him.

 

 

It seemed like hours that they stayed like that, James splayed out and Q in his lap. The stink of spilled alcohol and broken flowers dissipated as the climate control kicked on. James’ anger slipped from his grasp slowly, leaking away once more to leave a heavy exhaustion that weighed down his very bones. He knew he had to finish that report, but he suddenly didn’t even have the energy to keep rubbing Q’s back. _When did I start doing that, anyway?_ His hands paused, and Q sighed and stirred.

He’d been asleep.

 _He had cried himself to sleep. Jesus, I didn’t think grown men did that._ He chose that moment to forget that he’d done something to the same effect a few times over the years.

“Hmrm? Oh.” Q blinked up at him, his glasses askew on his angular face. “I’m afraid I fell asleep on you. I’m sorry.” He reached up and adjusted the frames, and slid off to the side, setting into the sofa cushions. “I...I’m sorry.” His voice was quiet. Soft. Worried.

“Don’t be.” That was all he had to say on that subject. James shifted and put his arm around Q’s shoulders, then pulled him close once more. “Don’t even be sorry for that.” He sighed, and looked away. “I’m...glad. Glad you came by. Could have been much worse.”

Q nodded. “Yes. It could have, couldn’t it.” He smirked in the way he did, part resigned and part playful. “Thank you. I don’t think I said that. But thank you.”

“Yeah.” James still didn’t want to meet Q’s eyes. “Don’t mention it.”

Q huffed out a laugh. “I won’t. We will have to do something about this mess, though, don’t you think?”

James shook his head. “Nope. Let the cleaning crew handle it. I think we need to go out and get spectacularly drunk and then shag in the backseat of my Audi. How does that sound?”

“That...sounds fantastic.” Q nodded. “Let me go get ready.” He pushed off the couch and padded to their bedroom, shutting the door behind him. James leaned back and groaned at the thought of getting up.

 _This wasn’t over._ They still had the memories, they still had the emotions, had the demons deep down in their minds, but at least the hounds were kept at bay a little longer. It was hard to exorcise something that kept coming back. Such was the life of an agent and employee of Her Majesty's Military Intelligence Section 6. But as long as they had...whatever this was...They would make it. Somehow. They would make it. Even if it was to flip one last middle finger at the world before they went down in flames.

James smiled, his first real one since he’d gotten back. It still felt wrong on his face, still felt a little forced. But it was a smile. Progress.


End file.
